wxastrocaptured image unplayable

[randum]

Hi,

I just got started out with my new spc 900nc webcam. My first attempt was overexposed, so I decided to try again with the gain set lower. Also, on my second attempt, I set the "Sample Format" to RGB24 (under Options->Settings). I think this is where I went wrong, seeing as how when I connected the camera, I chose YU12 640x480. I also added a FITS header this time.

Seeing as how my first attempt to process the images succeeded and none of my captures during my second attempt are playable, I'm guessing it's one of these settings that messed the video up.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to recover my data? I spent a long time out there.... I've searched for ways to recover the AVIs, such as through VirtualDub, downloading various codecs, or even just trying to play it in VLC, but to no avail. The best I see is a single green frame showing a white Mars.

I'd really appreciate any help!

Thanks,

Randum

[Dave]

I was going to suggest Virtual Dub, but I see you've tried that one.

I hope you resolve this. Nothing more annoying than losing hard earned data.

[Psychobilly]

I had a similar thing when playing about with various different codecs and settings a Livecam HD recently definitely sounds like a codec issue.. I was able to process the files through adobe premier to create a vanilla AVI

I take it its a "big" file...

Peter...

[red dwalf]

i tried the same as you and changed the settings to rgb, but i couldn`t get them to play either, i was trying to capture in the 3 different formats, so i wouldn`t chande them again, as for gain settings i think they need to be right down and no more than 10 frames per second when capturing as the avi`s will start to compress

[randum]

I just installed a trial version of Adobe Premiere, but when I try to open my avi, it reports "Unable to open that file. File is either damaged, an unsupported type, locked or in use by another application."

I had just rebooted, so there's no way that file is currently open.

As for Virtual Dub, when I try to open my file it says "Reconstructing mising index block (aggressive mode)" and then reports the following errors:

AVI: Index not found or damaged -- reconstructing via file scan.

AVI: Invalid chunk detected at 921856. Enabling aggressive recovery mode.

AVI: Keyframe flag reconstruction was not specified in open options and the video stream is not a known keyframe-only type. Seeking in the video stream may be extremely slow.

I can avoid the last error by re-deriving keyframe flags. The files are between 50 and 400 megabytes, so the data should still be there.

Though, there are certainly a lot of "01" values when looking at the file in a hex editor; I am afraid the file is unrecoverable.

I'll chalk it up to experience and hopefully others will see this and not make the same mistake of trying to record RGB24 with a YU12 capture device in wxastrocapture!

Thank you all for your responses, I appreciate the empathy and suggestions.

-Randum

[kookoo_gr]

i had the same problem when i installed the latest version of wxastrocapture. i recorded avi videos and my media player and registax software could not open them. i include the question i asked along with the asnwers at the yahoo group of wxastrocapture

kookoo_gr wrote:

> i installed the two last versions of wxastrocapture at my 6661 hp

> laptop with vista and although i see the video preview when the

> programs captures a video i can't see it at my windows media player

> and the registax software gives a bad video encoding message. the

> video encoding i used was at I420 at 640x480 and also at IYUV and

> YUV2 and at lower resolutions and i had the same results. i

> downgraded to the 1.6.2 version and i have absolutely no problems

> when i capture a video. i also installed the vcredist_x86. exe and i

> have the same problem with versions 1.7.1 and 1.7.2

Hmm, can you tell us *exactly* how you changed the encoding? The proper way

is via

Options -> Settings -> Video capture -> Sample Format

The two formats are typically IUV420 and RGB24

On Windows, there is also Camera -> Driver Dialogs -> Format, but that is

really a "back door" that we recommend you don't use unless you have no

other way. The dialogs under Camera -> Driver Dialogs belong to the camera

driver and not the wxAstroCapture application itself. If you change settings

there, then wxAstroCapture may produce conflicting data in the AVI. I have a

hunch this is the problem here.

Please try using IUV420 and RGB24 via the Options -> Settings -> Video

capture -> Sample Format feature and tell us whether it solves the problem.

If not, we need to think again.

Best regards

Carsten A. Arnholm

http://arnholm. org/

finally what i did is this

At the camera -> Driver Dialogs -> Format i changed the encondig to all the available formats with no success. after your reply to my original message i changed the Sample format from the Options -> Settings menu to YUV420 and it works fine. Also take notice that when i connect my camera from the connect menu of the program i used both the YUY20 and I420 format at 640x480 and it works fine with YUV420 but when i change the format to RGB24 then i have bad encoding problem.

unfortunatelly the videos i had recorded previously were still unplayable and therefore lost forever

[Space Cowboy]

This has happened to me too:mad:

[the rev]

I have a phillips webcam and run it through Vlounge which came with the software. It works very well, taking both images and avi's.

Kate

[jgs001]

I had that and was never able to recover/convert the content of the RGB24 avi to something useable.

[the rev]

When I trnsfer to registax it asks if it colour or mono and then stacks appropriately. Then I take it into photoshop to finish it off. Maybe I've been lucky, but I've never had a problem, and registax 5 is even better than 4.

Kate

[jgs001]

Kate, I don't think you can select the codec that vlounge is going to capture with. Depending on the wecam, if it's the SPC900 or a toucam flashed to look like one, you can get better quality captures, using the YUY2, but as the option is a radio button and the other option is RGB24 it's easy to pick the wrong one in something like wXAstroCapture or QFocus (the two apps I used to use)

[Space Cowboy]

Vlounge files are compressed so images not as good I thought?

[jgs001]

Not sure Stuart, I got fed up with guessing the settings... with no numerical value to go on in vlounge, I changed app very soon after getting the SPC900